OT: Tesla Road Test

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With or without "Ludicrous Speed"?

Bye Jack

SNIP

I think I'd rather have the 5L Mustang.... Thing that worries me about electric cars is what happens if a battery cell goes down? One car available in the UK will lease the battery. That then makes it an uneconomic deal...

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The battery is the most reliable part of the car. The Chevy Volt has been on sale in the US since 2011, and as of late 2016 GM claims they've had to replace exactly zero packs due to capacity degradation, out of something like 200k units sold.

The FUD early on was that you'd be looking at maybe 50% capacity loss by

100k miles. There are Volts out there now with 250k, 300k miles on them and IIRC the capacity loss on the highest EV-miles models was around 3%, worst case.

I mean, yeah, a cell could fail catastrophically. And your automatic transmission could seize up. Your timing belt/chain could snap and you interference engine could smash itself to pieces. Oh my God, anything could happen.

There was a single post-crash Volt fire in an early production model, which was ironically caused by insufficient protection of the terminals of the regular lead-acid 12 volt battery (it's in the back, under the floor of the hatch.)

Did your sales person mention the tire size on the front is different than on the back?? Think about it....................

Or that you can't play a music CD without some extra magic hardware??

Just asking...........................

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** I know - it means the car goes faster backwards than forwards....

** Err - a CD player?

Wot a psycho troll

..... Phil

I'm guessing that someone considering dropping 100 G on a Musk Corp. supercar doesn't give a shit about any of this.

Anyone who is complaining about the lack of a stock CD player in a 100k car in 2017 was likely a contemporary of Abraham Lincoln.

Probably also makes posts about how if CDs had been "done right" they'd have a 32 bit word length and 192kHz sampling rate

Nice to know.... out of interest, what is the battery pack spec ? TIA

The first gen had a 16 kWh/45 A/h stack of which around 11kWh was usable with the remaining as reserve. The second gen's usable capacity is slightly larger, around 13.5kWh. From what I've read it's unclear whether the charge management system slides into the reserve capacity to maintain usable capacity as the battery ages.

On a warm day I could pull maybe 50 miles of EV-only range out of the first gen's pack after a full charge in normal suburban driving. I can get 70 miles of range out of the second gen's pack no problem at all. Highway crusing on level ground at 65 the display usually reports the drivetrain is drawing 10-12 kW; with the accelerator jammed to the floor from a dead stop the drivetrain "redlines" at around 108 kW.

There's a backup 4 cylinder rated for around 95 hp; I think it's a slightly modified version of the stock Chevy Cruze engine, with an 8 gallon tank. Since it's a series hybrid though you can switch back and forth between EV-only and hybrid drivetrain configurations at will...the engine isn't usually directly connected to the drivetrain planetary gear system and IIRC instead drives the secondary traction motor as a generator.

There's also a mode to charge the battery up from zero about a third of the way using engine power but that's not very useful except in a couple circumstances.

Gas only on the highway I usually get around 42 mpg; best I ever did was

52 mpg over about 20 miles of 50mph undivided highway in eastern Connecticut through gently rolling hills; just accelerating briefly near the peak and then coasting down and using regenerated power part of the way up the next.

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How long will it run if the air conditioning is turned on?

John

Air conditioning in the summer isn't the range-killer, it's heating in the winter!

I'm sure the X comes with heated seats; on most EVs for mortals heated seats and steering wheel are options. They're options you need!

Since the Volt has a gas engine too it has an "engine assist heating" option in its settings; when it's selected and the outside temperature is below around ~35 F the engine will come on for a minute or two until the cabin and battery coolant comes up to a civilized temperature

The only times the Volt has felt sluggish during cold temperatures were a few bitterly cold mornings when the outdoor temperature got down into the single-digit negatives; the dash display dinged and complained with a "Propulsion Power Reduced!" message for a couple minutes until everything got up to temp

snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com wrote on 6/21/2017 2:33 AM:

I think he turned on Ludicrous at one point. He referred to it a different way as turning off the limit or something. He couldn't decide whether I would understand the terminology or not and sometimes referred to things by their Tesla name and other times not. Maybe "ludicrous" is a trigger phrase for some people.

It was all so much faster than my present V6 pickup that it didn't really matter. The thing about it wasn't the acceleration exactly, it is as much the fact that it does it without any indication other than being mashed into the seat and the numbers ramping up. No engine roar, no gears whining. It's so quiet and smooth. Like when a high-rise elevator takes off and your stomach is left behind.

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Rick C

TTman wrote on 6/21/2017 4:39 AM:

I don't get what you are saying. "lease" the battery??? FYI the Tesla battery has an 8 year warranty.

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Rick C

Why would I want to play a music CD when it has streaming audio? I will ask about a USB or SD port or wifi to upload from my collection. Thanks.

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Rick C

What??? If you give this a tiny amount of thought, you will realize all the accessories combined (including the heater and headlights) are tiny compared to moving the car. Does your Volvo slow down when the AC comes on?

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Rick C

Alternate bursts of 0.6G acceleration followed by 0.6G braking may be fun for some people (who don't have female passengers) but that's not good for range. Neither is using lights, heat, a/c, driving hills, or driving in cold weather.

This is interesting:

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John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 

lunatic fringe electronics

On Wednesday, June 21, 2017 at 8:33:39 AM UTC-7, John Larkin wrote: ...

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Lights have negligible effect. A/C doesn't either around the south SF bay. Even hills don't cause too much reduction in range because the energy is reclaimed going down the other side.

I have regularly been over the Santa Cruz mountains from Los Gatos to Santa Cruz an EV and reclaim quite a few kWh on the downhill side so the overall efficiency is not affected too much.

You're right about the heating though, some EVs use a heat pump but surprisingly Tesla doesn't.

kevin

On Wednesday, June 21, 2017 at 8:29:29 AM UTC-7, rickman wrote: ...

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Nissan has an option to lease the battery when purchasing an EV in the UK.

In general the warranty only covers complete failure - not degradation.

In the US EV manufacturers will only replace the battery if it degrades more than 30%. Nissan had to replace a few early Leaf batteries (unlike all other EVs they don't have temperature management of the battery, all the others actively cool the battery).

kevin